R.G. Kar: Junior doctors reject Mamata Banerjee’s invite to meet

Taking exception to the “language of the email”, agitating junior doctors on Tuesday, 10 September, rejected West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee’s invitation for talks at the state secretariat to resolve the impasse over the R.G. Kar hospital issue.

Banerjee had on Tuesday evening invited the agitating junior doctors for a meeting.

"Your small delegation (maximum 10 persons) may visit ‘Nabanna’ now to meet government representatives," an email sent by the state’s health secretary N.S. Nigam to the protesting medics said.

“The language of the communication is not only disrespectful to us doctors, it’s downright insensitive. We find no reason to reply to this mail,” said Dr Debasish Halder, a leader of the protesting doctors who organised a sit-in before the state health department headquarters at Swasthya Bhavan in Salt Lake, Kolkata.

The doctors conveyed that although the “doors remain open” for talks with the state’s highest authorities, they would continue with their agitation till their demands are met.

Meanwhile, West Bengal minister of state for health and family welfare Chandrima Bhattacharya said that the chief minister was waiting at her chamber for the delegation of junior doctors to arrive for the meeting.

"The chief minister has been waiting at her chamber... We are yet to get any reply from them," Bhattacharya said.

Speaking to reporters, one of the agitating junior doctors said receiving the mail from Nigam is an “insult for us”, as they have been seeking his resignation over the RG Kar hospital issue.

"We did not get any mail from the state secretariat. We got the mail from the state health secretary, whose resignation we seek. This is an insult,” he said.

The medic said it was also “humiliating” that the state government restricted the number of representatives for the meeting to 10.

"Our protests and our cease-work will continue," he asserted.

Junior doctors across West Bengal have been observing a cease-work at state-run hospitals to demand justice for the young doctor, who was allegedly raped and murdered at R.G. Kar Medical College and Hospital in Kolkata in August.

The protesting doctors have also defied the 5:00 p.m. deadline set by the Supreme Court to return to work, and conveyed their intention to stay put outside Swasthya Bhavan and keep pressing for their demands.

In the 'Clean Up Swasthya Bhavan' march earlier in the day, the agitating doctors demanded the resignations of the health secretary, the director of health Education (DHE) and the director of health services (DHS) for the state, besides pressing for marching orders to Kolkata Police commissioner Vineet Goyal as part of their five-point demand charter.

The protesters had, for their part, also set a 5:00 p.m. deadline coinciding with the timeframe outlined by the apex court, for the state administration to act on their demands.

Addressing the media shortly after 7.30 p.m. at Nabanna, minister Chandrima Bhattacharya claimed that the chief minister had taken a “positive approach” by extending her olive branch to the agitating medics.

“The email was sent to the official ID of the Junior Doctors’ Front at around 6:10 p.m.” Bhattacharya said. “The chief minister was waiting for the doctors’ delegation to come for the meeting. She left her office at 7:30 p.m. since there was no response from the protesters.”